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Group protests lack of toilets
By PHYLLIS FURMAN
DAILY NEWS BUSINESS WRITER
A group that wants to see more public toilets in the city is about to make a big stink.
Get ready to see men urinating on the street - cardboard copies that is.
These peeing Toms, set to hit the streets tomorrow, are part of a guerilla ad campaign being plotted by a band of potty-demanding New Yorkers called The Privy Council.
Just in time for the Christmas rush, the group plans to spread the life-like cutouts, as well as cardboard toilets, in high traffic areas across the city, including Times Square and Rockefeller Center.
The faux toilet seats will be placed on top of the city's green garbage cans.
The props may be gone in a day depending on the weather, the Sanitation Department, and the reaction from passers-by.
The stunt, created pro bono by advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi N.Y., is aimed at flushing away a serious problem, Privy Council chief Steve Stollman told the Daily News.
Stollman, an East Houston St. shop owner, has been pressing for potties since 1997. He's riled up over the city's recent move to add just 20 public toilets. The city has entered into discussions with Spanish advertising conglomerate Cemusa - which is set to eventually take control of the city's newsstands and bus shelters and build the outhouses.
The new potties would be self-cleaning and cost $1 or less per visit. Cemusa will assume the cost of building and maintaining them, and then try to make money by selling advertising outside.
"That's kind of a joke," Stollman said of the 20 public outhouses planned by the city. "There are 18 million people in the New York metro area, and 20 toilets?"
The Saatchi & Saatchi duo handling the matter, associate creative directors Neil Levin and Michael Vaughn, are better known for TV campaigns like the current Tide to Go commercial featuring a drill sergeant yelling at a soldier who has a stain on his shirt.
They said they reached out to Stollman about helping support his toilet cause.
Their goal in the campaign is to raise awareness at City Hall and on the streets. They want to illustrate what desperate people think about as a last resort when they really, really have to go.
"The peeing guy, he's doing what people think about who have to go to the bathroom," Levin said.
City officials declined to comment.
Over the years, three of the city's mayors have tried to tackle the toilet shortage, but got bogged down by legal disputes. A key concern has been vandalism and residents not wanting toilets nearby.
But public toilets are commonplace overseas, Stollman noted. "It's built into the culture," he said.
One idea he suggests: offering incentives to businesses like Starbucks to make their bathrooms more widely available to nonpatrons in addition to building additional attended toilets in public areas like parks.
"We could have a citywide system of 2,000 public toilets," he said.
Originally published on December 15, 2005
By PHYLLIS FURMAN
DAILY NEWS BUSINESS WRITER
A group that wants to see more public toilets in the city is about to make a big stink.
Get ready to see men urinating on the street - cardboard copies that is.
These peeing Toms, set to hit the streets tomorrow, are part of a guerilla ad campaign being plotted by a band of potty-demanding New Yorkers called The Privy Council.
Just in time for the Christmas rush, the group plans to spread the life-like cutouts, as well as cardboard toilets, in high traffic areas across the city, including Times Square and Rockefeller Center.
The faux toilet seats will be placed on top of the city's green garbage cans.
The props may be gone in a day depending on the weather, the Sanitation Department, and the reaction from passers-by.
The stunt, created pro bono by advertising agency Saatchi & Saatchi N.Y., is aimed at flushing away a serious problem, Privy Council chief Steve Stollman told the Daily News.
Stollman, an East Houston St. shop owner, has been pressing for potties since 1997. He's riled up over the city's recent move to add just 20 public toilets. The city has entered into discussions with Spanish advertising conglomerate Cemusa - which is set to eventually take control of the city's newsstands and bus shelters and build the outhouses.
The new potties would be self-cleaning and cost $1 or less per visit. Cemusa will assume the cost of building and maintaining them, and then try to make money by selling advertising outside.
"That's kind of a joke," Stollman said of the 20 public outhouses planned by the city. "There are 18 million people in the New York metro area, and 20 toilets?"
The Saatchi & Saatchi duo handling the matter, associate creative directors Neil Levin and Michael Vaughn, are better known for TV campaigns like the current Tide to Go commercial featuring a drill sergeant yelling at a soldier who has a stain on his shirt.
They said they reached out to Stollman about helping support his toilet cause.
Their goal in the campaign is to raise awareness at City Hall and on the streets. They want to illustrate what desperate people think about as a last resort when they really, really have to go.
"The peeing guy, he's doing what people think about who have to go to the bathroom," Levin said.
City officials declined to comment.
Over the years, three of the city's mayors have tried to tackle the toilet shortage, but got bogged down by legal disputes. A key concern has been vandalism and residents not wanting toilets nearby.
But public toilets are commonplace overseas, Stollman noted. "It's built into the culture," he said.
One idea he suggests: offering incentives to businesses like Starbucks to make their bathrooms more widely available to nonpatrons in addition to building additional attended toilets in public areas like parks.
"We could have a citywide system of 2,000 public toilets," he said.
Originally published on December 15, 2005